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Translator’s Introduction
The
Tafs
ī
r al-Jal
ā
layn (‘The Commentary of the Two Jal
ā
ls’) is one of the most well-known and
popular commentaries that have come down to us from the medieval Islamic period. It is the work of a
teacher,
Jal
ā
l al-D
ī
n Mu
ḥ
ammad b. A
ḥ
mad al-Ma
ḥ
all
ī
(d. 864/1459), and his student, Jal
ā
l al-D
ī
n 'Abd al-
Ra
ḥ
m
ā
n al-Suy
ūṭī
(d. 911/1505). Al-Suy
ūṭī
himself informs us (see his comments at the end of Q. 17) that
his teacher, al-Ma
ḥ
all
ī
, had composed a commentary (on the F
ā
ti
ḥ
a, and from s
ū
rat al-Kahf, Q. 18, to s
ū
rat
al-N
ā
s, Q. 114), which he then completed with a commentary on the remainder (the more substantial
section from s
ū
rat al-Baqara, Q. 2 to the end of s
ū
rat al-Isr
ā
', Q. 17). In its formal structure, this Sunni
commentary is of the type known as
musalsal (‘chained’) commentary, a step-by-step explanation of key
aspects of the Qur'
ā
nic narrative, allowing for quicker reference and digestion of the text.
[18]
The method of
exegesis used is known as
tafs
ī
r bi’l-ma'th
ū
r (‘exegesis according to reports’), which means that it draws
principally upon the
ḥ
ad
ī
th narrations that go back to the Prophet, the Companions (
ṣ
a
ḥā
ba) and prominent
figures from among the Successor (
t
ā
bi'
ū
n) generation.
Jal
ā
l al-D
ī
n al-Ma
ḥ
all
ī
was an Egyptian Sh
ā
fi'
ī
scholar and jurist who wrote treatises on law and legal
theory. He wrote a number of ‘commentaries’ (
shar
ḥ
) on works of other authors, the most prominent of
which are a
shar
ḥ
on
Jam' al-jaw
ā
mi' (‘The Collected collections’) of T
ā
j al-D
ī
n al-Subk
ī
(d. 771/1370),
entitled
al-Badr al-
ṭā
li' f
ī
ḥ
all jam' al-jaw
ā
hir (‘The Rising Full Moon Concerning the Resolution of the
Collection of Jewels’),
another on the Minh
ā
j al-
ṭā
lib
ī
n (‘The Path of the Knowledge-seekers’) by al-Nawaw
ī
(d. 675/1277), which is actually mentioned by al-Suy
ūṭī
in this commentary at the point where he takes over
from al-Ma
ḥ
all
ī
,
[19]
and one on al-Juwayn
ī
’s (d. 478/1085)
al-Waraq
ā
t f
ī
u
ṣū
l al-d
ī
n (‘Notes Concerning
Jurisprudence’).
Of the ‘two Jal
ā
ls’, however, by far the more prolific and better known is al-Suy
ūṭī
, who also lived
most of his life in Cairo. At a very young age, he was already teaching Sh
ā
fi'
ī
law, even giving some
fatwas,
and, as the famous Ibn
Ḥ
ajar al-'Asqal
ā
n
ī
had once done, al-Suy
ūṭī
dictated
ḥ
ad
ī
th in the mosque of Ibn
Ṭ
ul
ū
n, where al-Suy
ūṭī
’s father had been a preacher. Al-Suy
ūṭī
had a prodigious memory (as he himself was
sometimes wont to note), and it is said that he knew by heart all the
ḥ
ad
ī
ths that had come to his
knowledge (some 200,000). His rapid development and rise to fame earned him the envy of fellow scholars,
something to which his numerous ‘response’ works (
al-radd 'al
ā
) attest; the most famous of his rivals was
Mu
ḥ
ammad al-Sakh
ā
w
ī
(d. 902/1497). Such rivalry was further fuelled by al-Suy
ūṭī
’s claims, sometime
before the end of the 9
th
Muslim century, to have reached the rank of
mujtahid in Sh
ā
fi'
ī
law and to be the
‘renewer’ of Islam (
mujaddid) for that era. Al-Suy
ūṭī
, however, gradually became disenchanted by public life,
particulary, by what he saw as the corrupt and ignorant scholarly milieu of his time.
As well as being a legal expert, al-Suy
ūṭī
wrote on history: his best-known works in this field are the
Ta'r
ī
kh al-khulaf
ā
' (‘History of the Caliphs’), and his Egyptian history,
Ḥ
usn al-mu
ḥāḍ
ara (‘The Excellent
Lecture’). He was also interested in the sciences related to the Arabic language, as can be seen in the
Jal
ā
layn commentary. Other well-known works are
al-Durr al-manth
ū
r f
ī
'l-tafs
ī
r bi'l-ma'th
ū
r (‘The Scattered
Pearls Of Traditional Exegesis’), focusing exclusively on
ḥ
ad
ī
th, and his Lub
ā
b al-nuq
ū
l f
ī
asb
ā
b al-nuz
ū
l
(‘The Prime Entries Concerning the Occasions of Revelation’), dealing with the circumstances of Qur'
ā
nic
verse revelation, which one frequently finds appended in the margins of modern editions of the
Tafs
ī
r al-
Jal
ā
layn;
[20]
in addition to these one might also mention his
al-Itq
ā
n f
ī
'ul
ū
m al-Qur'
ā
n (‘Mastery of the
Sciences of the Qur'
ā
n’). On a personal level, al-Suy
ūṭī
was a devoted Sufi and in a number of works he
sought to explain the harmony that must exist between commitment to the Sufi
ṭ
ar
ī
qa and the individual’s
obligation to the Divine
shar
ī
'a.
[21]
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